‘Unless you spend it on her,’ said Isobel forcefully. This was the hard sell, all right. She looked sad, as if Sellers had spoiled all her fun. He resolved not to spend a single penny in bloody Rudolphy’s, whatever it turned out to be.

His phone buzzed in his pocket, providing him with the perfect excuse to leave. ‘I’ve got to take this call,’ he told Isobel, though he knew it was only a text landing. He was keen to get out of the Sturridge house and away from the Freak Siblings, and was relishing the prospect of a slow walk down the hill with dazzling views and fresh air to accompany him: compensation for what he’d suffered on the way up.

The text was from Lisa Norbury, Joshua’s sister. Sellers probably wouldn’t have followed up on his original message. They’d already been over Josh Norbury’s house with a fine-tooth comb; he knew he’d find nothing useful. After his last encounter with Sondra Halliday, it had felt important to Sellers to show he cared about the dead man she barely bothered to mention, but he’d be showing no one but himself, effectively. It was a vanity exercise.

Still, this was the one thing he’d set in motion without consulting any of his team. If he cancelled it, he’d feel lame. He had to see it through. Sighing, Sellers started to compose a text to send to Lisa in reply, sounding more grateful and enthusiastic than he felt.

Gibbs wanted to talk about alibis for Billy’s first four kill dates, but Drew Hopwood wanted to talk only about money. Mostly, what he wanted to say was that money mattered not a jot to him. It mattered so little that, at every opportunity, he brought the conversation back to it.

‘If I could trade what I’m going to inherit from Gran for her still being alive, it’d be a no-brainer. I’ll be getting something in the region of three hundred grand, but I’d swap that for having her back any day of the week. She was like a second mother to me.’

Gibbs decided Hopwood was a no-brainer. You didn’t have to be Einstein to do a passable impression of a non-materialistic person: just don’t insert the words ‘roughly three hundred grand’ or ‘around three hundred k’ into your every sentence.

Hopwood had arrived at Spilling nick like an applicant for a prestigious job, clean-shaven and eager for his interview in a smart grey suit, navy tie and shiny black shoes.